A man's two-year waiting in Nigeria for an immigrant visa interview

How long a person must wait depends on their preference category and their country of citizenship. (welcomia/Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Q: My wife, a green card holder, petitioned for me in 2016. I'm waiting at my home in Nigeria for my immigrant visa interview. Is this lengthy waiting time normal?L., Nigeria

A: You should get to the front of the line for your green card about two years after your wife petitioned for you. That's according to the monthly Department of State visa bulletin.

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This month, to get a green card in the Second Preference A category — spouses of permanent residents and the unmarried children (under age 21) of permanent residents — applicants from Nigeria qualify if a petition was filed for them before Feb. 1, 2016.

Relatives of permanent residents and some relatives of U.S. citizens must get to the front of the line under the quota system to get an immigrant visa.

How long a person must wait depends on their preference category and their country of citizenship. The annual quota for all family preferences is 226,000, with each category getting a set number of visas.

If more people qualify for visas in a category than allowed, a "backlog" develops. Each month, the Department of State issues a bulletin that lists the cutoff dates for quota visa applicants for the coming month. If your place in line (your "priority date") is before the bulletin cutoff date, you qualify to get a visa during the stated month.

As a family-based immigration preference immigrant, your priority is the date U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services received your petition.

Cutoff date movement is hard to predict. Still, by checking the cutoff date for your country and your preference category, you can guess how long it will take for you to get to the front of the line.

Check the Department of State Visa Bulletin online at travel.state.gov.

Get the bulletin by emailing listserv@calist.state. gov. In the message part of the email, write Subscribe Visa-Bulletin. You can also find the cutoff by calling (202) 485-7699.

Allan Wernick is an attorney and director of the City University of New York's Citizenship Now! project. Send questions and comments to Allan Wernick, New York Daily News, 4 New York Plaza, New York, NY 10004 or email to questions@allanwernick.com. Follow him on Twitter @awernick.